Retired Villainess Transmigrates into a Cannon Fodder

Golden Agent of the Adonis (14)

Chu Xiang first set the mobile phone to the ‘do not disturb’ mode and resumed communications in the afternoon to answer the company’s call. Faced with the concern of the Director of the Public Relations Department, her voice became weaker and she said with self-deprecation, “I’m fine. How was I to know that giving my all was merely a blessing in disguise? At the very least, I managed to help one person achieve his dreams, so that’s enough for me..”

Her words also contained certain hints, but compared with Chen Lifeng’s statement, she clearly thought about making sure that she would be cleansed from any and all accusations. However, she made herself appear that due to the impact of the artists’ statements, the company was going to have to give up on her in order to maintain a good stance. She was completely thinking about the company as she thought about their viewpoints and was hoping for nothing more than to resolve it internally.

As for Chen Lifeng? After discussing it with Zhou Yuan and Li Ou in private, they even shared their statements about Chu Xiang without informing the company, making the matter a hot topic. Their actions weren’t taking the company seriously at all.

Even if both of them ambiguously hinted that the other party was at fault, the staff were leaning towards Chu Xiang’s side. It felt like she wasn’t the one who was a troublemaker, based on her current attitude and work ethic. If she’s really said to be so obsessed and problematic, wouldn’t a ruckus have blown up a long time ago? Would things be able to remain that calm and peaceful up until now?

Chu Xiang sighed again and said with emotion, “My thoughts were naive. I thought this matter would be easy to solve since we belonged to the same company. I forgot about Zhou Yuan and the studio that she opened by herself. She also has a close cooperative relationship with Hong Yao, so after Chen Lifeng’s contract expires, it’s only natural for him to go with her.”

The Director of the PR department asked sensitively, “Chen Lifeng intends to terminate the contract with the company?”

Chu Xiang said, “I don’t know. After all, he has been prepared for a long time and managed to keep everything from me. Maybe Li Ou would know about this sort of stuff better than me. I’m merely speculating here, but if he wasn’t going to leave, was there any other reason to cooperate with them to go against us? If they were to get married and work in their own studio, they would be able to bring in more profits from the buzz, so why wouldn’t he leave?”

Chen Lifeng had just won the Best Actor Award and was in a relationship, so the company hadn’t thought about the possibility of his contract being terminated. After all, he became popular by relying on Xingchen Entertainment’s resources and help. Therefore, they merely thought that it was natural for him to rise up the ranks as best as he could.

But with Chu Xiang’s words, they started to think of the matter in a different light. Zhou Yuan was 30 years old and now that she was with an elite candidate like Chen Lifeng, she might get married with him someday. Zhou Yuan’s resources were very good and working in her own studio would definitely earn more than signing with a company. Hong Yao was also an entertainment company that was comparable to Xingchen, so why would Chen Lifeng stay?

Chen Lifeng’s non-renewal of his current contract was a very likely thing to happen and it wasn’t something that could be clarified with one discussion. Chen Lifeng had gone behind the company’s back a few times from this incident, so he wasn’t that trustworthy as of now. Thinking about how Chu Xiang and Chen Lifeng have been together for so many years and his current actions towards her, how could he have any feelings for the company?

A trade-off— although one had a higher commercial value than the other, he was likely to leave. Although an artist who had his name tarnished might still become famous and continue to make money for the company, the best method was to keep both sides to make further resource allocations based on the follow-up development.

With the company’s support, Chu Xiang’s matters would be handled easily.

Chu Xiang said to the company, “I have some connections with a romance-based variety show at the moment. I have a good relationship with the producer and I slot in Chen Lifeng and Zhou Yuan to attend it together. The ratings of the first season of this variety show were sky high, so the second season also seems to be very popular and the audience has been looking forward to it for a long time. It was created at a good timing as this sort of opportunity is rare. The two of them have just been together and have not yet been blessed by their fans. Wouldn’t it be good to be a CP fan through this variety show and make the fans change their views on the couple? If they plan to get married, it’d be good to go on the show to make a few wonderful memories just for a keepsake.”

The Director of the Public Relations Department was surprised, “Chu Xiang, you don’t have a fever, do you? What nonsense are you talking about? You want to use your  resources on them? For what, to seek peace?”

Chu Xiang laughed when she heard her unconsciously biased words, “I’m not seeking peace; it’s just an exchange. I’m willing to trade these benefits if they agree to cooperate with me. After all, a win-win situation will be good for everyone.”

The Director of the Public Relations Department felt that Chu Xiang was undermining herself a tad too much, but she knew from the company’s point of view that this would be the best result. Unable to persuade Chu Xiang out loud, she just sighed and said, “The company will try our best to help you reconcile. ”

That morning, the company was still eager to know who was in the right and who was in the wrong as they needed to avoid a crisis from occurring in the company. By evening, it seemed that everyone had their own point of view on this matter in their hearts since everyone wanted to save Chu Xiang. The matter of not damaging Chen Lifeng’s commercial value seemed to have morphed into a task, whereas helping Chu Xiang became a subconscious idea in their hearts.

Fang Zhenxuan waited for Chu Xiang to hang up the phone before he said in a slightly puzzled manner, “I thought you would fight back, but I didn’t expect you to yearn for a win-win situation. Are you going to be satisfied with that?”

Chu Xiang laughed, “Who says it’s a win-win situation? That’s merely lip service to fool the company. Although the ratings of the variety show are good, it still depends on the couple’s chemistry to attract the public’s attention. The program is a magic mirror that can reflect the sweet, romanticness of some couples, but it can also show hypocrisy as well. Even if there is post-editing, things would remain the same. Couples like Chen Lifeng and Zhou Yuan, who have just fallen in love, do not know each other and need to get to know each other from scratch. These obstacles and bumps will appear on TV for everyone to see and I have also found a sweet couple for comparison. Just wait and see; they’re going to fall into a pit the moment they accept this offer. Besides, I still have a backup as well.”